[GA_Wolf]

Ok, so I have the starting Technomancer in another thread. Still really interested in that too. Here's a Technomancer focused on Droning. Worked from my other Technomancer and looking at this post: http://forums.shadowrun4.com/index.php?topic=4352.msg62350#msg62350

Not sure what drones to buy. The tool I have doesn't have the drones in it mentioned in the post, and I don't have the referenced book either, just the core.


ATTRIBUTES                        Walk/Run            10   25
   Body:   4               Charisma:   4            EDGE:   2   
   Agility:   1               Intuition:   5            Phys Init   7   
   Reaction:   2               Logic:   5            Passes   1   
   Strength:   3               Willpower:   4            Resonance:   5   



ACTIVE SKILLS                  
Hacking  4
Software  4
Gunnery  6
Infiltration  3
Perception  3
Tasking (Group)  4
Electronic Warfare  1
Pilot Aircraft  1
Pilot Ground Craft  1
Data Search  1
Computer  1


KNOWLEDGE SKILLS               
Procedure (Matrix Security)  4
Matrix Theory  3
Operating Systems  5
Computer Theory  3
Matrix Games  4
Criminal (Seattle Gangs)  3
Street Drugs  2


QUALITIES                        
Low-Light Vision
Codeslinger  10
Addiction (Moderate)  -10
Media Junkie (Mild)  -5
Prejudiced (Common, Biased)  -10
Addiction (Moderate)  -10

FORMS                  Resonance: 5         
Forms:
Analyze (Computer) 5
Browse (Data Search) 3
Command (misc.) 5
Armor 3
Defuse (Hacking) 5
Exploit (Hacking) 5
Spoof (Hacking) 5
Stealth 5
Track (Computer) 3

CONTACTS                        
Mechanic (Loy. 3 Con. 2)
Fixer (Loy. 2 Con. 2)

GEAR, ETC???

Armor?
Vehicle?
Which drones?

[UmaroVI]

By "just the core" do you mean just SR4A, or just SR4A plus Unwired? You really need Unwired to play a technomancer. I'm assuming you do have Unwired and just don't have more obscure stuff like This Old Drone.

You are an orc, right? I can't see it listed but your stats match up and you seem to have Low-light Vision.

What stream are you? If you want to dronomance, you should definitely pick an Intuition stream with Machine Sprites.

2 Reaction vs. 1 Reaction isn't actually going to help you too much; I'd get something else instead.

4 Charisma is fine; you're getting something (more registered sprites) for it. You could go down to 3 and be alright, but it's something that is nice to have.

You really don't want 5 logic. It does little to nothing for you, and you don't need 10 complex forms. You especially don't want to be hardcapping it! I suggest 3.

You really don't want 4 willpower. Even willpower makes Baby Dunkelzahn cry; go down to 3 (you round UP for your stun boxes).

You really, really want Resonance 6. It determines a huge amount of what you do and will save you karma in the long run because of how buying up CFs works.

Infiltration and Perception 3 is karma-inefficient; I'd suggest going 2 and 4, or scraping up 8 more bp for 4 and 4.

Don't buy the Tasking group, because Decompiling is useless. Buy Compiling and Registering separately.

You need to actually buy the Technomancer quality.

Codeslinger is for Control Device, right?

You have waaaaaay too many complex forms. You don't want to have some CFs at 3, either; you want your CFs at 6 because of how buying new ones works. Starting with a 6 and buying a second one to 3 is 6 karma. Starting with two 3s and buying one of them up to a 6 is 15 karma. Also, in general, Technos are good because of their ability to get really high ratings on a few complex forms and being able to thread up "good enough" on everything else.

Cut Browse, Armor, Defuse, and Track. You could take just the 5 remaining CFs at 6. Or you could pick up Disarm. For Cybercombat, you are best off having sprites fight for you rather than doing it yourself; you are simply never going to be good at cybercombat because you are fighting people who just reboot when they "die," whereas you die in real life. If you are really worried about it, the Shield CF is a better investment than Armor.

Gear-wise, what books, exactly, do you have access to? You mentioned you're using a tool - does it have the Arsenal drones and mods in it? SR4A alone is missing a lot of stuff to make rigging functional.

[Sengir]

Umaro has already covered a lot of it, so just the couple of extra remarks
- Whatever you do, put the full 200 BP intro attributes. You never get them as cheap as during chargen
- Multiple Physical stats on 1 mean you are a cripple. Some GMs let this slip, but on my table such low attributes will shoot the player in the foot at some point
- Willpower is a clear case of  "depends", if you plan to spend some time jumped in the extra point is very well worth it
- Logic is your soak stat for matrix damage and used for most technical skills, I recommend not dropping it below 4.
- Speaking of technical skills, you might want a couple of points in Hardware and Build/Repair skills, unless you want to subcontract each and every sensor upgrade on a drone
- My standard drones
-- Doberman with White Knight LMG, Armor, and Gecko Tips for combat
-- Fly-Spy with Rating 6 camera, microphone, and radio signal scanner for scouting
-- Stormcloud for aerial overwatch

[UmaroVI]

So, Sengir makes a good point about attributes at 1. I did recommend Reaction 1 rather than 2 but some GMs will shaft you for this and you should probably just ask your GM.

I also agree about attributes by and large, but Technos tend to be really, REALLY tight on BPs so you may not be able to. A big thing, though, is that as a techno you will have nothing to spend money you earn on BUT drones and vehicles (aside from minor stuff), so money is the place to skimp at chargen.

Jumping in is bad and you don't want to. It is especially bad as a Technomancer.

Logic is the sort of thing that would be cool to have a lot of, but not as cool as other stuff. 3 is my cutoff. You CAN make a logic-based techno, but you can't afford to be a logic-based techno and also be a good rigger. Similarly, you just can't really afford technical skills; the Mechanic contact is a good plan.*

*If you want technical skills, Biowire gives you a way to learn them down the road. But you're not going to be able to start with not-sucky technical skills without shooting yourself in the foot. This is true in general of "it might be nice to have sometimes" skills - wait until you can Biowire it. 

[Sengir]

Jumping in is bad and you don't want to. It is especially bad as a Technomancer.

Normally, using Command is no better than jumping in, just slower. With plenty of munchkinism, a Command-Mancer can boost his dice pools to crazy heights, but that's a clear case of "win more"

And remember, what you can do with Command, an NPC can do with Spoof. A single spoofed ifconfig wl0 down and your precious drone is a fancy paperweight

[UmaroVI]

I'm not sure "have command 6 and then use Threading and Assist Operation" really counts as "Munchkinism." Jumping In is going to leave you with a significantly smaller dice pool, and it also leaves you with the big problem that you have to upgrade the Sensor and Response of your drones to not suck. A Command rigger can easily get good use out of cheap drones.

There are of course times when jumping in is worth it, but it should be a trick you do on occasion, not what you're built around.

Spoofing is a problem for sure, but there's stuff you can do to defend against it:

1) Set your drones to refuse all commands from anyone without an Admin account. This might be a shitty idea with modern computer systems, but in the Grim Darkness of the future the best practice is to always run in admin and not allow anything else.

2) Upgrade your drone's Pilot and Firewall to 6. Obviously only worth it on expensive drones.

3) Use cheap drones. If one gets spoofed to shut down or something, command a different one. Slap an AK-97 on a Doberman or a Ford-LEBD-1 and a good command rigger can be plenty deadly with it.

[kirk]

UmaroIV, I think he's referring to the fact that command is a simple action for the jumped in rigger (SR4A 229) but complex by remote control (SR4A 245).  Thus "faster".

[Sengir]

I'm not sure "have command 6 and then use Threading and Assist Operation" really counts as "Munchkinism."

The "munchkinism" was aimed at the aim of boosting a more than sufficient dice pool rather than the methods. Although I certainly disapprove your interpretation of endless re-threading

Jumping In is going to leave you with a significantly smaller dice pool, and it also leaves you with the big problem that you have to upgrade the Sensor and Response of your drones to not suck.

I see that as an advantage, one can literally buy extra dice at the price of a few cheap sensors and a Response chip.

1) Set your drones to refuse all commands from anyone without an Admin account. This might be a shitty idea with modern computer systems, but in the Grim Darkness of the future the best practice is to always run in admin and not allow anything else.

2) Upgrade your drone's Pilot and Firewall to 6. Obviously only worth it on expensive drones.

The problem is that the drone's DP is pretty much limited to 12, even counting the -6 dice for admin commands a hacker can easily beat that. Should he fail, he can simply try again, since it is explicitly stated that a failed Spoof test does not raise an alarm. Spoofing is a major problem for every rigger, so being safe from that is a huge boon.

[UmaroVI]

Even without Infinity Threading, you'll have way more dice as a Command rigger than a Jumped In rigger.

[The Big Peat]

I'm not much of an expert on Drones, so someone correct me if wrong, but isn't Electronic Warfare fairly important in case they start trying to cut the signal - or is that only ordinary riggers?

The low physical stats, I will echo, are asking for it. It's still quite possibly worth it, thats your call. But I know that as a GM I'd sure as hell target them at some point too.

[UmaroVI]

You need a little EW, but you can afford to not be ultra-awesome with it because of the way ECCM works; you do, however, want to own a Satellite Link.

[Aron]

With only an EW of 1 (and a threaded Scan CF), how do you ever get enough successes to hit the threshold of 4 to detect hidden nodes?  Sniffing seems like it would also be difficult with such a low EW (also assuming a threaded Sniffer CF).

[UmaroVI]

Several types of sprites can find hidden nodes for you pretty easily. Low EW and no Scan means that you can't find hidden nodes fast, and it would be nice to be able to find them fast, but it's not vital. It's also cheaper to buy up Scan and EW than it is to start with medium-ish ranks in everything because of the way CF costs scale.

The other thing is that there's not a harsh penalty for failing either of these things and having to try again, it's just a delay.

Keep in mind, I'm not saying EW is a waste of points in the same way that, say, Decompiling is; I'm just saying it's something you can survive with having at a 1. It would be nice to have more, certainly.

[Sengir]

Even without Infinity Threading, you'll have way more dice as a Command rigger than a Jumped In rigger.

See, that's why I'm calling munchkin: You don't even bother to address my claim that both build can reach plenty enough dice, but merely insist that your pool is bigger.

Both jump-in and Command riggers can easily start with 20 dice right out of chargen and reach 30-something with a bit of Karma and Nuyen. Once you have reached that point, what do another five dice give you? In those few cases where they are needed I'll simply use Edge, that's what it's for.

Just for reference, the gunnery pool of a jumped-in rigger
Response 6
Gunnery 6
Specialization 2
Hot Sim 2
Smartlink 2
R5 Machine Sprite running Diagnostics ~3

That's already 21 dice with hardly anything the player needs to bend over backwards for. Not sensational, but neither something that's "bad and you don't want to"

Further improvements
Control Rig 2 (fill the remaining Essence with other useful stuff, Damage Compensators are nice for example)
Max out Sprite assistance, another 3
Immersion Echo 2
Active targeting (roll a Perception test vs. target's Agility, add hits to dice pool)

[kirk]

Sengir? Sprites and echoes are technomancer only.